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Newegg Launches Gaming PC Finder Tool, but Is It Fair or Foul?
Popular online tech retailer Newegg has launched a new shopping tool designed to simplify gaming PC choices for customers. The new Gaming PC Finder(opens in new tab) asks you to pick up to four titles from a selection of 18; then, you choose the monitor resolution at which you would like to play. Clicking 'view results' presents a list of pre-built PCs with the top two choices highlighted, as below.
The above two PCs are based on our choosing a selection of fast-paced and competitive eSports titles and a target 1080p monitor. You can see the 'Starter' choice offers up to 285fps in the games chosen and is based on the combined processing power of an Intel Core i5-12400F and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060. This ABS Master gaming PC is priced at $1,199 but might be overspec'd and expensive if your monitor is limited to 144Hz, for example.
Newegg's so-called 'Mainstream' choice for the selection of eSport titles looks a lot more like up-selling. This choice provides up to 384fps in the target games and resolution. Based on an Intel Core i7-12700F and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070, this should be a capable machine for almost all titles, not just eSports, using an FHD monitor. Unfortunately, it isn't a minor step up in price either. At $2,100, this MSI gaming desktop is approaching double the cost of the 'Starter' choice.
Upselling or Futureproofing?
Some eSports gamers will already have or intend to purchase a fast refresh rate monitor, making these desktop choices more sensible. However, it is probably more accurate to characterize the Newegg Gaming PC Finder tool with its 'Mainstream' selection as upselling rather than futureproofing. Running these eSports titles at 1080p will be satisfactory on an RTX 3060 for the foreseeable future. However, the beauty of PCs is that you can upgrade any 'slow' component in a couple of years to reap very appealing gains.
The Newegg eSports recommendations were somewhat questionable, particularly with those looking to spend a minimum amount of money. So, we thought we would have another shot at the Gaming PC Finder tool and select just one graphically demanding modern action RPG game at a target resolution of 1440p. We chose Cyberpunk 2077 in the Newegg tool, selected 1440p, and clicked go.
With this kind of game, players don't typically aim for frame rates much higher than 60 or 70fps. Thus Newegg's 'Starter' choice here seems smart, choosing an older gen hexacore CPU, and putting more of the budget into the GPU – an RTX 3060 Ti (compared to the eSports Starter choice). This $1,199 desktop PC is claimed to hit up to 50fps in Cyberpunk at 1440p.
Newegg's mainstream choice doesn't go overboard, targeting 65fps, but costs a lot more at $1,964. You can scroll down Newegg's recommendations page and there are pre-built PC configurations that purportedly play Cyberpunk at 25fps ($1,015) or 75fps ($2,299).
In our own tests of Cyberpunk 2077 at 1440p Ultra we found that the above recommended 'Starter' GPU of the RTX 3060 Ti could hit 52fps on average, basically agreeing with Newegg's Gaming PC Finder tool. Moreover, if you want to enable ray tracing and apply DLSS with the Balanced profile, you could achieve over 48fps on average with the same GPU. With this in mind, the Newegg Starter and Mainstream choices for Cyberpunk 2077 seem reasonable. However, with a bit of thought and reading through Tom's Hardware reviews and guides, a PC enthusiast or DIYer could spend their money more wisely, especially at the higher end.
